Regina George Has Always Been a Lesbian

Since the original Mean Girls film came out in 2004, many queer women have read the character of Regina George as a lesbian icon, despite the fact that the movie makes no such claims about Regina’s sexuality. In the 2024 version of the film—unofficially known as Mean Girls: The Musical: The Movie, which is based on the Broadway musical which was based on the original film (are you following?)—there are still no big declarations about Regina’s queerness, but it does strengthen the case for a queer reading of Regina—one that even straight people could pick up on.

For years, star Reneé Rapp has been saying the quiet part out loud regarding the role she stepped into on Broadway in 2019: Regina George is a lesbian. She’s even joked that God is the one who told her as much. But now that Rapp, who is bisexual, is reprising her role as the queen bee in the new version of the film, she is preaching the gospel that the lead Plastic is a big ol’ lez to a much larger audience. And with the release of Rapp's new single “Not My Fault” off the film’s soundtrack (with fellow queer artist Megan Thee Stallion) that includes the line “Can a gay girl get an amen?” we have a much more explicit wink to this reality.

But did we really need it? Or is the (potential) textually explicit acknowledgment actually for everyone else to finally understand that Regina George is—and always has been—a lesbian?

Rewatch the original 2004 film starring Rachel McAdams as Regina: Regina is lowkey obsessed with Cady (Lindsay Lohan) and seems wholly disinterested in her actual boyfriend. Not only that, Regina starts a rumor that Janis Ian (Lizzy Caplan) is gay. Regina claims the two used to be best friends until Janis became jealous of Regina’s boyfriend. It’s why Janis hates Regina so much, and, at one point, she even mocks Regina by saying, “I have a big lesbian crush on you.”

What always seemed clear to me, as a queer viewer, was that the most likely explanation for Regina pointing the finger at Janis's potential queerness was to keep anyone from pointing fingers at Regina’s. The self-hating homosexual is a trope for a reason—think of the homophobic bully David Karofsky on Glee, who ended up being gay himself, or all the politicians who pass anti-gay legislation while hiding the fact they, themselves, are gay.

At the end of the 2004 film, Regina finds solace and acceptance on the lacrosse field—sure, as a way to get out her anger and aggression, but potentially also as a place to find other queer women who will accept and celebrate her for who she is (women’s sports teams are known to be overwhelmingly queer, if not queer-friendly, spaces). It’s worth noting that Regina quips that it’s Janice’s dream to fall into a pile of girls during the scene in the gym after Regina lets the Burn Book loose, but it’s Regina who ends the film at the bottom of an all-girl pile-on with her lacrosse team.

“Regina being super girly, popular, and even mean makes her character stand out to me as a femme lesbian icon,” says Emma Claire Ellis, a 24-year-old fan of the film from Austin, Texas. Ellis is one of several queer Mean Girls fans I spoke to about their thoughts on Regina’s sexual identity, which continues to be a popular talking point..

“We often see stories of closeted high schoolers, but Regina’s story resonates more with a teen deep in the trenches of [compulsory heterosexuality, or “comphet”]. As someone who experienced comphet into my 20s, in part because I am hyper feminine and didn’t think I fit the mold of a gay woman, I appreciate that representation.”

The 2024 film builds on this storyline. The updated reason given for the falling out between Janis (whose name is now Janis Imi’ike and is played by queer actress Auli’i Cravalho) and Regina involves even more explicitly homophobic bullying on Regina’s part. After playing the role of supportive friend and ally to Janis when Janis came out, Regina kisses her during a game of spin the bottle and says she knew Janis would do it, because Janis is “obsessed” with her.

“Previously, in our ’04 version, ‘lesbian’ for Janis was used kind of as a slur, and we’re taking that back,” Cravalho said in an interview with Screen Rant. Speaking of Janis, she says, “I am a pyro-lez, loud and proud. I will light your backpack on fire if you talk shit about me.”

The choice to make Janis openly gay in this new version of the film strengthens the case for Regina being jealous that Janis is so comfortable being who she is—something Regina struggles to embrace for herself. The homoerotic best friendship that leads to a major falling-out is such a common experience in the life of many queer girls that the idea that it is a “canon event” has even become a trend on lesbian TikTok. (Queering this version of the film even further is Avantika, who plays Plastic Karen Shetty; she declared her character “a pan queen,” saying, “If you tell me Karen is anything but pansexual, I have beef with you.”)

Fans of Mean Girls who see queerness in Regina often see elements of their own experiences in her storyline. “I think as a trans femme person, although not one who identifies as a lesbian necessarily, I’ve always been interested in relationships between women where there’s some kind of underlying queerness to them,” says Erique Zhang, a 35-year-old from New York. “I actually told my partner that I feel like I’ve had borderline romantic friendships with some of my friends that I never identified as such, especially before I transitioned… So I see a lot of those same kinds of undertones in Regina, especially with her frenemies relationship with Cady.”

Regina pursues both Aaron Samuels and Shane Oman in both versions of the film (the “boy-crazy girl” to “lesbian” pipeline is also a common “canon event” for queer women). It’s worth noting that she goes after Aaron to prevent Cady from dating him—could that be because Regina is the one who likes Cady and doesn’t want someone else to have her?

“There are just so many moments where she’s clearly acting out to get Cady’s attention—the famous scene where she kisses Aaron Samuels in front of Cady to make her jealous is a prime example,” says Zhang. “Like, why would Regina want Cady to be jealous of her so much? And, of course, there’s the irony of her saying that Janis was obsessed with her, when she’s actually kind of obsessed with Cady.”

Ellis concurs: “I think a lot of lesbians who dated men can relate to this feeling of only seeing men as desirable if other women believed the same—wanting to impress them, or make them jealous.”

Our introduction to Regina in the musical film would also support this reading. We meet Regina in the cafeteria. After she spots the new girl, Cady, she sings “I am Regina George,” by way of introduction, but the song feels incredibly sexual. Rapp, as Regina, wears black leather and runs her hands down her torso, the camera focuses on her mouth and then her breasts, almost as if she is trying to seduce Cady. And Cady watches her, mouth agape, seemingly mesmerized by Regina’s beauty.

Moments like these appear throughout the rest of the film. Rapp has said she explicitly played the famous line, “Get in, loser” as if Regina were flirting with Cady. Later, the rest of the cast performs a song about Regina called “Apex Predator,” building on yet another trope—the predatory lesbian. And in the footage at the Spring Fling dance that plays during the film’s credits, Regina is seen expressing physical affection towards both Janis and Cady while ignoring all of the male students—which include Aaron and Regina’s date (and supposed boyfriend), Shane (she’s also high on pain medication after getting hit by a bus, suggesting that perhaps her inhibitions and defenses are lowered, revealing her truer feelings).

Earlier this year, Rapp told Teen Vogue that in the new film, “[Regina is] also very gay," which Teen Vogue clarifies as "perhaps not in the canonical sense of the term, but Rapp promises the vibes will be there." But the vibes have always been there. It’s just that straight people often lack media literacy and the ability to read queer subtext unless it’s spelled out for them with a coming out storyline or a proclamation. And so Rapp gave it to them—and the filmmakers clearly agree, because they cast Rapp in the role knowing she was openly queer and becoming a sapphic icon. Rapp’s been allowed to continue announcing Regina’s queerness in public and posting about it on social media, and there’s even a nod to it in “Not My Fault,” which Rapp co-wrote. She’s also spent much of her press tour for the film saying that she explicitly played Regina as gay.

That Regina is queer “was always my interpretation of it, still is my interpretation of it,” Rapp said in an interview with them. “It might not be other people’s, and I truly don’t care. It’s mine, and that’s how I feel.”

She continued: “Aaron… is just the conduit for Regina and Janice and Cady to all go at each other, right? I don’t really know that Regina cares about him whatsoever. I think it’s actually quite evident that she doesn’t, to me.” In a perfect world, we’d get a version of Mean Girls in which Janis and Regina end up together. And since the film includes fellow queer actress Cravalho as an openly gay Janis, there would have been no better time to do it. At least Cravalho has said that she, too, is on board with that reading, claiming that Regina and Janis could have been “THEE power couple.” Which, to me, means it’s canon.

Art is art and will always be open to interpretation, but the stars of the film have spoken and their interpretation is clear: Regina George is—and always has been—a lesbian.